News, opinion, insights and highlights of college hoops, featuring the Player of the Day

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Mid-day Madness: Big East Notches a Pair of Wins

(6) Marquette 74 (11) Kentucky 66Kentucky turned this into a street brawl, and nearly pulled off the upset, though Marquette's speed and skill players eventually triumphed.

Kentucky's Joe Crawford scored a career-high 35 points in his final game as a collegian, but it was not enough as the Golden Eagles made their free throws down the stretch and defended the three-point line well.

Jerel McNeal scored 20 for Marquette, while his teammates, Dominic James and Wesley Matthews hit a combined 17-20 from the foul line.

Marquette is likely to face Stanford on Saturday, as the Cardinal is a heavy favorite over Cornell later today.

(8) UNLV 71 (9) Kent St. 58The Runnin' Rebels held Kent State to an NCAA tournament record-low ten points in the fist half and cruised to an easy first round win. Joe Darger had 19 and Wink Adams threw in 18 points. The Rebels will find the going a little rougher in their second round game against Kansas.

(6) Purdue 90 (11) Baylor 79As many had suspected, the Baylor Bears, in addition to three or four other Big 12 entrants to the tourney, did not belong. Purdue stymied the Bears, who were just 5-8 down the stretch, making Baylor's appearance in the NCAA tourney a short and forgettable one.

Purdue's balanced scoring included 8 players with between 8 and 17 points apiece.

Purdue advances to a second round matchup with Xavier on Saturday.

(4) Pittsburgh 82 (13) Oral Roberts 63One of the hottest teams heading in, Pittsburgh went about the job of dissecting Oral Roberts with all the efficiency of a skilled surgeon. The Panthers held the Golden Eagles to 34% shooting in the rout.